When Lilly McElroy posted her ad on Craigslist, she was very specific about what she was looking for in a man. She wanted someone tall, someone sturdy, someone who wouldn’t duck or stumble if she gathered the force of her five-foot-three, 135-pound frame and threw herself headlong at him. In a month’s time she got about 30 replies. She set up a few dates and always brought along a friend.
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The photos didn’t turn out that night, two years ago, but McElroy has been seeking out men to leap at ever since. Some of the results, in an exhibition titled “I Throw Myself at Men,” are currently on display at the Thomas Robertello Gallery in West Town.
“The idea for this project came from this really misconceived video I was working on,” she says. A couple years back, McElroy convinced the management of Carol’s Pub in Uptown to let her film herself wrestling a stranger from the crowd on the dance floor. “I have no idea why the bar let me do this,” she says. “I have this really awful video of me wrestling this dude, and we took a picture of me sort of lunging towards him. The only good thing that came out of that project was that picture.” It inspired a new photo series exploring the romantic dynamic between men and women that flipped the cliche of the desperate woman on its head. “Like I’m taking a bit of the desperation out and putting back the power of making a connection no matter what,” McElroy explains.
The bulk of McElroy’s art deals to some degree with reaching out to others. “I’m interested in creating connections with people, no matter what the context is,” she says. “Either creating a connection with people, or making an experience out of something.”
She has no plan to stop throwing herself at men any time soon. “There’s something really satisfying about just lunging at someone as hard as you can,” she says, “and hoping that everything goes well.”v
Through April 19, 6-9 PM, Thomas Robertello Gallery, 939 W. Randolph, 312-421-1587, thomasrobertello.com
